Herons of Pickerington Ponds

My sister and I stopped at Pickerington Ponds to see what was there.  We had never been there so we wanted a new experience.  With Susie (my GPS) guiding the way, we finally found it....the first thing we saw was this........

A Heron Rookery!  Of course I pull off the road to get pictures.

              

It was amazing to see them in the nest with their babies, not allot of room!

This is another view of the Rookery.  There were ducks and a Belted Kingfisher.

He is on the tree limb to the right.  I know this picture isn't that great but there seems to be a bird or duck on the branch below the Kingfisher.
We also saw American Goldfinch.  They were in this flower section.

They were flying around everywhere...one minute you saw them then they were hidden in the flowers.

At the lookout at the Glacier Knoll Picnic area, my Sister spotted an Osprey.

He was way in the distance, but he was watching everything going on from his perch.

We hope to return one day and spend more time, it is a big place.

Friday Drive in June!

My sister and I just took off for a quick drive to Deer Creek to see how the Osprey were doing. We arrived and found them on the nest.  The happy couple have twins!  They both look very strong.  They were hot and hopefully they will survive the heat.

When we got there both parents were on the nest too.  I was a little excited and those pictures of the family group, well they were a bit blurry. She knew we were there and kept making this chirping sound and then a boat of fisherman came up and past right under the nest and she took off!

 She made a circle and came back in for a landing. I was thrilled to get pictures of this.

So we decided to leave her and her babies, and drive around the lake. In this one tree we saw a couple of  Eastern Kingbirds.

Then we saw this bird flying out across the water and back into this dead tree.  Oh My!! It was a Red-headed Woodpecker!

He was beautiful. He let us watch him for quite a while.  We figured he was catching bugs. Was a fun sight to watch.  We were feeling pretty great after these two birds......

 A butterfly group by the water. Lots of  Pearl Crescent, above and a couple of American Snout, left, and the bottom is a Common Buckeye.  They were hot too. Made a very colorful sight.

So back into the car and on to our next pull off sight.......

This cute chipmunk stopped climbing the tree the moment he saw us and we saw him.  He sat there and let me take pictures.

Now we are excited and ready for our next stop!!!

 This Belted Kingfisher was way in the distance but we could still see him and they are so pretty.

The Indigo Bunting is breathtaking! He was singing to us (well we like to think that! LOL)
So we were really having a great drive.  We had also seen some Herons, Grackles, Robins, a Great Crested Flycatcher, Tree Swallows, Purple Martins and an other bird I haven't ID yet.  We had seen an amazing amount of birds but a few turtles too....so off to the Dairy Queen for ice cream and drive down Canal Rd on the way home.......We didn't think the day could get any better....

We heard him before he flew down and landed, this beautiful Belted Kingfisher and then when he flew on down the Canal...here comes another one!  So we thought maybe a fledgling because they were both males.

But wait...there is more to this story.....
We pulled off the road by the falls (dry right now) and the pond and decided to walk the path for a while......it wasn't long when this flew right past us....

 Two Red-headed Woodpeckers!  As we were walking down the path, they kept flying back and forth from tree to tree.  We just couldn't believe our luck.  We had only seen one, once about 4 or 5 years ago. Today we had seen 3 and 3 Belted Kingfishers....a very great day for bird watching for us....

After they flew away we headed back to the car and drove on home and decided to stop at Hopewell (Mound City) and see what was there. We didn't see much as it was getting to sundown but on the way back to our car....

This handsome Blue Bird bid us good night!  His spouse was sitting on the branch above him but she blended into the tree to much for me to get a picture of her.  It had been an exciting day.